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,Y 



No. 1 8. 



A VANISHED RACE OF 
ABORIGINAL FOUNDERS 




STEADFAST FOR GOD AND COFXTRV 



AN ADDRESS HV 

BRIG.-GEXERAL HENRY STUART TURRILL, U.S.A. 

Genealogist and Past Councillor-General 

DELIVERED BEFORE ' 

THE NEW YORK SOCIETY 

0\ THE 

ORDER OF THE FOUNDERS AND 
PATRIOTS OF AMERICA 

AT THE HOTEL MANHATTAN, NEW YORK 



FEBRUARY 14, 1907 



Published by the Society. 



No. 1 8. 



A VANISHED RACE OF 
ABORIGINAL FOUNDERS 




STEADFAST FOR GOD AND COUNTRY 



AN ADDRESS BY 

BRIG.-GENERAL HENRY STUART TURRILL, U.S.A. 

Genealogist and Past Councillor-General 

DELIVERED BEFORE 

THE NEW YORK SOCIETY 

OF THE 

ORDER OF THE FOUNDERS AND 
PATRIOTS OF AMERICA 

AT THE HOTEL MANHATTAN, NEW YORK 



FEBRUARY 14, 1907 



Published by the Society. 



E^^ 



Gift 
^ Sooiet? ' 



THE NEW YORK SOCIETY 

OF THE 

^ Order of the Founders and Patriots of America 



■s- 



OFFICERS 

FOR THE YEAR ENDING APRIL Ig, I907 



) — y Governor 

° THEODORE FITCH 

Deputy Governor 

EDWARD HAGAMAN HALL 

Chaplain 

Rev. EDWARD PAYSON JOHNSON, D.D. 

See^rtary 

Col. CHARLES HITCHCOCK SHERRILL 

Treastirer 

MATTHEW HINMAN 

State Attorney 

EDGAR ABEL TURRELL 

Rci^istrar 

WINCHESTER FITCH 

Genealogist 

Brig.-Gen. HENRY STUART TURRILL, U. S. A. 

Historian 

CLARENCE ETTIENNE LEONARD 

Cotuicillors 

I 904-190 7 

Col. henry WOODWARD SACKETT 

THEODORE OILMAN 

COLGATE HOYT 

1905-1908 

CHARLES WATERMAN BENTLEY WILKINSON 

Col. RALPH EARL PRIME 

WILLIAM ALLEN MARBLE 

1906-19C9 

Major-Gen. FREDERICK DENT GRANT, U. S. A. 

GEORGE CLINTON BATCHELLER 

HENRY WICKES GOODRICH 



A Vx^NISHED RACE OF ABORIGINAL 
FOUNDERS 



Mr. Governor^ Ladies and Gentlemen, and Associates of ilie Order of 
the Founders and Patriots of America : 

If a right-angled triangle were to be erected in New Mexico, 
the base along the Rio Grande from Las Cruces to Socoro, the 
perpendicular west to near the Arizona line, the hypothenuse 
from this apex to the point of departure, Las Cruces, within 
this triangle is embraced some of the fairest mountain regions 
that it has ever been my fortune to explore. My first visit to 
this region was rather exceptional, even for the very varied 
duties of an army officer on frontier duty. 

Under army supervision several bands of the Apaches had 
been gathered together on the eastern slopes of the Membres 
Mountains, and had their agency for several years at the little 
Mexican pueblo of Canada Alamosa. It was found that this 
situation brought the Indians into close contact with the 
demoralizing influences of the small Mexican towns along the 
Rio Grande. It was, therefore, determined, if a suitable 
place more remote from the settled portion of the country could 
be found, to establish a reservation and build an agency and an 
army post and to remove these Indians to it. A Board consist- 
ing of the Commanding Officer of the District of New Mexico, 
the Indian Superintendent of New Mexico and Arizona and 
myself were appointed to examine and select a proper spot for 
such an establishment. 

The only road (other than Indian trails) that led into this 
region was an old, little used wagon trail that led from Rio 
Grande across the Leuerra Plains to the Little Colorado River 
in Arizona. The two senior members of the Board were of an 
age that rendered travel on horseback over the exceedingly 
rough Indian trails of the mountains extremely disagreeable, 
if not dangerous. So it was determined that I should go with 
the Indians to such places as they were satisfied with, and, 
when a spot was found that I should deem suitable for the pur- 
pose, find a road to the spot and guide the party to it for a final 
consideration of the matter. 



I had picked up a sort of polyglot language, consisting of 
English, Spanish, Apache and Navajo words, with quite a bit of 
" sign talk " that rendered communication with the Indians easy; 
indeed for a long time my name among these Indians was " Big 
Soldier Man that Talks Apache." 

And thus alone with more than a hundred of the wildest 
Indians of the frontier for weeks I roamed through this beautiful 
Indian paradise. I must say for my wild entertainers that never 
in all my service have I received such constant care for my per- 
sonal safety. Did we come to a difficult bit of the mountain 
trails, a stalwart savage was at my pony's head and another had 
hold of his tail, and the whole procession was stopped until I 
was safely down, for fear that some rock might be detached by 
those following and I be injured by its fall, Loco saying "that 
I must not be hurt, as it would be laid to the Indians and would 
make trouble." 

The Mogollion Mountain range, extending along the southwest 
side of the triangle, from the northwest to the southeast, and 
presenting for almost its entire length a bold, rocky wall, whose 
cloud-capped peaks seem like a curtain around the land to cut 
it off from the sweltering heat and choking sand storms of the 
Gila and San Francisco valleys, and the great sweltering plains 
of southwestern New Mexico. 

Many a longing look has been cast from the crawling wagon 
trains or the ancient overland coach, as they dragged their 
weary way day after day across these dreary wastes to the land 
beyond those cloud-capped peaks, and visions of flashing rills 
and cool shades have surged through the fevered brains of the 
thirst-maddened toilers. 

At the base of the triangle extending from Socoro to Las 
Cruces winds the Rio Grande, an occasional flash of brown 
waters, through the broad belt of vivid green of its cottonwood 
embowered valley, the brown foothills of the Membres range 
gradually rising to the deep green of its pine-clad summit. On 
the northern side, or the perpendicular of the triangle, extending 
from Socoro to the Arizona line, stand a line of sentinel peaks, 
the Sierra Magdalena, the Picacho Mogino, the Sierra Leuerras 
and the Sierra Dactil, each guarding a green valley that winds 
from the north into this paradise of mountain life. Within this 
triangle are three distinct mountain chains, the Mogollion. the 



Tularosa and the Membres range, with innumerable detached 
peaks and intervening valleys. 

In this region three rivers of considerable size have their 
origin, the Gila, the San Francisco and the Membres. On the 
eastern slope of the Membres range five or six small streams 
flow down to the Rio Grande. The fountain head of these rivers 
are innumerable little springs and fountains, welling out from 
under some moss-covered rock, a little thread of bright water 
joining with other threads and winding and twisting in the deep 
shade, fretting and foaming over the gray and red rocks, for all 
of this region is of the old granite and sienite formation ; then 
rippling more sedately through broader valleys, under the shade 
of the centuries-old pines, their massive brown columns rising 
more than a hundred feet in air and supporting an almost 
impenetrable roof of green foliage and affording a most delight- 
ful shade for the denizens of the region, man and animal alike. 
At intervals these valleys open out into broader savannas, a 
billowy sea of waving bent grass, wild rye and oats, and as the 
streams enlarge by the joining of many of these mountain brooks 
the valleys narrow and are filled with dense groves of the Amer- 
ican acacia. The bordering rough granite foothills are covered 
with the "tuny," the " mescal " and " yucca" up to their '' piiion"- 
covered summits. 

The animal life of this region was as varied and abundant as 
the vegetable. Through the thickets and over the rough hills 
the American " grizzly " (the acknowledged king of the animals 
of the western wilds) unmolested took his way, with his little 
less formidable cousin, the cinnamon bear, supreme in the animal 
kingdom. The elk, the mule or black tailed deer and the red or 
fallow deer cropped the sweet mountain " gramma " or wandered 
at their own sweet will over the plains or through the close- 
covered thickets of those mountain valleys. The large timber 
woU, the dreaded " lobo," with the mountain lion, took second 
place in control of the region, while the bobcat and ocelot with 
the despised coyote took a much lower place, and were only a 
terror to the mountain rats and rabbits and the bird life of the 
region, and these were not lacking, for the call of the wild 
turkey and the drumming of the ruffed grouse was heard from 
every thicket, and the blue, the tufted and the mecena quail 
literally covered the country, so that the life of these minor 



8 

marauders was one of ease and plenty. In the mountain meadows 
where it was possible the industrious beaver had built his dam 
and fashioned his snug house, admitting to a tolerated acquaint- 
ance the muskrat, the otter and the mink, and here they lived 
in perfect accord with the myriads of brown-spotted trout, at 
least did the beaver and muskrat, for it is probable that the otter 
and mink dined often upon their finny friends. 

For unnumbered ages the bright sun warmed this land ; the 
gentle showers brought into existence all of this world of green 
and gold. The mighty pines, that were the product of centuries, 
grown old and riven by some mountain storm, sank to slow 
decay, to be replaced by a new creation. 

At last into this smiling land came a new factor, Man. The 
first rude traces of his occupation are to be found on that won- 
derful mesa of southern Colorado and in the cliff dwellings of 
Cafion Chelly, these so far in the dark ages of the past that no 
estimate of their age can be made. That they lived and toiled 
for years, probably for centuries, is all the record that they have 
left. 

After them another wave of Founders came from the north to 
the land, the Aztec. This first great tide swept southward, 
leaving little islands of semi-civilization where conditions were 
satisfactory and ending in the empire of Mexico. The region 
in this land that they chose for their abiding place is on a line 
across New Mexico and Arizona to the Pacific, from a point 
somewhat north of Las Vegas, and on the south, from the ruins 
of the Grand Quivero, near the northern point of the Sierra 
Blanca, westward to the Pacific. Within this region they built 
many of their many-storied villages, of which some remain to 
this day, with all of the customs and the religion of that far-off age. 

Again long years must have passed, and while yet in the dark- 
ness of pre-historic times came another wave of Founders, this 
an entirely primitive man, a thorough and complete savage, the 
Apache, inventing nothing, copying little from their more intel- 
ligent neighbors ; they are passing away, the most complete 
type of savage man. Their numbers were not large, but their 
cunning and warlike qualities enabled them to maintain their 
existence against their much more numerous and intelligent 
neighbors, the Aztecs. They early discovered the Indian para- 
dise just described and there they fixed their home. They were 



from the first and always have been a mountain Indian, and as 
their numbers increased, as with few warlike tribes about them 
they were bound to do, the surplus sought other mountains and 
established other families. The Mescalero, the Jigarilla, the 
White Mountain and the Tonto Apaches thus came to be bands 
of the Apache nation, and so the nation came into existence. 
But always and as long as they could maintain their hold on it 
this favored land was considered their home. 

There had been but little effort on the part of the Aztecs to 
occupy this part of the country. The ruins of the Corona del 
Pueblo, near Socoro, and a small ruined pueblo in one of the 
upper valleys of the San Francisco were all the evidences of 
Aztec occupation that I have ever seen in the Apache country. 
This ruin in the San Francisco valley was of very ancient date. 
Standing by the ruin with Loco, a more than ordinarly intelli- 
gent chief of the Apaches, I asked him : "Who were these people?" 
Waving his hand toward the north, he said : " Montezuma ! long, 
long ago my people drove them away." 

For long years, probably for centuries, if the traditions of 
both people can be trusted, the Apaches lived somewhat in 
accord with their Aztec neighbors to the north and south of 
them, and their bands spread as far east as the mountains on the 
west of the Pecos valley, and west through the mountain region 
of Arizona as far as the Colorado, The mutual desire to share 
in the rich hunting regions of the buffalo country, from which 
they were alike driven by the more numerous and active tribes 
of the Indians of the plains, led to an armed neutrality at home 
and an active co-operation for war upon the plains and formed 
as much of a bond of friendship as could be expected between 
two such dissimilar peoples. 

Nearly four hundred years ago there came to this land, to the 
Aztec and Apache alike, a most wonderful happening. The 
Apache from his mountain fastness and the Aztec from the top 
of his many-storied stone house saw slowly winding up the 
valley of the Rio Grande a glittering train, that wound like a 
great serpent into their land. It would have been impossible to 
have flashed a greater wonder upon these people. Here was a 
band of beings who controlled and produced at will the thunder 
and lightning, that so much dreaded natural element, the wrath 
of an offended God, to the savage mind ; who, clad in shining 



raiment, flashing like the sun, were carried with the speed of the 
wind upon creatures the like of which their wildest imagination 
had never conceived. No wonder that the Apache believed 
that the Montezuma of the " stone house people " had come out 
of the sun to his faithful followers and that certain destruction 
awaited them, the Ishmael of the land. 

This certainly was a most memorable meeting, the crudest of 
the stone age, the obsidian arrow head, lance point and knife, 
matched against the steel-clad warrior on his barbed charger, 
the flash of his gleaming lance mingling with the duller but 
more sinister gleam of his Toledo blade. It is no wonder that 
after a few encounters with the mailclad followers of Alvara 
Munez (Cabreza de Vaca), when, in 1536, they first swept over 
the country, that the Apache quickly fled to the shelter of his 
mountains and left his Aztec neighbor to the mercy of his God. 

In the succeeding invasions of Juan Vasquez de Coronado, in 
1539 and 1540, and of Juan de Onate, in 1598 and 1599, all of the 
Aztec villages were brought under Spanish rule. The Apache 
in his mountain strongholds alone remained unsubdued. Evi- 
dence is not wanting that in some of their encounters with the 
Conquistadors the Apache came off with the honors of war. I 
have on one or two occasions found among them genuine old 
Toledo blades, used as lance heads, and on one of them, even 
after the lapse of centuries, could be traced among the blue 
wavy lines of the genuine Toledo, in quaint old Spanish text, 
the inscription, " Draw me not without cause, sheath me not 
without honor." This old blade was the pride of its Indian 
possessor and treasured as evidence of his family's valor in the 
" old times." 

After a few attempts at conquest by the soldiers, and of con- 
version by the priests, and finding that neither gold nor souls 
were to be won, these hardy warriors were left in comparative 
peace in their mountain strongholds. In the old manuscripts of 
the mission period of New Mexico and Arizona the soldiers seem 
o have regarded him as a good fighting man, the conquest of 
whom might afford some credit to his arms. To the priest, 
however, he was ever an object of the greatest abhorrence, and 
the kindest names that could be found for him in their descrip- 
tion were " the mountain devils," "children of the devil," with- 



IJ 

out souls, and fully akin to their great captain, the North 
American grizzly. 

Through the entire time of the Spanish occupation of the 
country the Apaches seem to have held their mountain homes, 
with only occasional encounters with the soldiers of Spain. A 
rather interesting document exists among the very early records 
of the church at El Paso, Mexico. It is an order by the Span- 
isli commander (at the request of the head of the Church) to a 
commandante in the Spanish service to take two hundred and 
fifty soldiers and to go to the great pine forests on the " Rio 
Bravo" and to there cut and prepare the "vegas"for the church 
then being built at El Paso. This order was dated September, 
1627. At the bottom of this order is the report of the com- 
mandante, saying that he had gone up the "Rio Bravo " a great 
distance, more than sixty leagues, to the pine country, where he 
fixed his camp and cut and prepared the timber for the next 
high water in the river; that, owing to the many alarms and at- 
tacks from the wild men of the mountains, it was the Spring 
rise of 1629 before he was able to complete his task and bring 
the timber to El Paso. This camp must have been about the 
mouth of the Cuchillo Negro. On the head waters of this river 
had long been the principal village of the Apaches, and this 
document furnishes the evidence that at this early date these 
mountain warriors had to be taken into account, even by the 
veterans of Spain. I would say that those same vegas still sup- 
port the roof of the church in El Paso. 

After the establishment of the Republic of Mexico and the 
departure of the Spanish soldiers the Apaches seem to have been 
much more a power for evil. The new government seems not 
to have held them in check as had the Spanish. Here came to 
front an Indian family that has, I think, no parallel in our In- 
dian history. We have records of the lives of many illus- 
trious Indians, nature's great men; but these rarely are great 
for more than one generation, of much less consequence in the 
second and disappearing in the third. During the period from 
the establishment of the Republic of Mexico and the close of the 
Mexican War, when the country passed to the control of the 
United States, the deeds of an Apache chief spread terror along 
the settlements of the Rio Grande from El Paso to Santa Fe. 



His home was on the upper waters of one of the small rivers 
that flow to the Rio Grande from the eastern slopes of the Mem- 
bres Mountains. His name, Cuchillo Negro, signifying Black 
Knife, carried terror through all the Mexican and Indian pueblos 
in all the surrounding countr}^ He was the most advanced in 
the rude civilization of the country of any Apache chieftain that 
had preceded him. Recognizing the added comforts that the 
crude agriculture of the country gave to even the hunting In- 
dian, and not wishing to have the trouble of wresting the scanty 
crops from his surrounding neighbors, with his hardy warriors 
he would sweep down on some Mexican hamlet and carry the 
entire population off to his mountain stronghold, and there hold 
them as slaves, compelling them to dig asequias and cultivate 
for his use the crops common to the country. The evidences of 
this cultivation still existed in and about his village at the time 
that I first saw his country. He was living at the time of 
General Harney's conquest of the country in 1848, but was said 
to have been a very old man at that date and to have died about 
1853 I was never able to learn much of him, as the old Mexi- 
cans always spoke of him with " bated breath " as "muy malo," 
and the old trappers and plainsman like Kit Carson, St. Vrain 
and Frank de Lisle (the two last I knew intimately) never ven- 
tured into his country. He was ever known as the most terrible 
scourge that the country had ever known. The Indians and 
Mexicans both claimed that he came of a long line of chieftains, 
the Indians saying that his family had always been the head of 
the Apache nation. At his death he left two sons. The eldest, 
Mangus Colorado, succeeded to the chieftainship of the tribe, 
while the second son (whose name I was never able to learn) was in 
command of a band of considerable strength. Mangus Colorado 
had one son, Castile, who on Mangus' murder in the guardhouse 
at Fort Bayard in 1864 became the head of the tribe. Castile 
was killed in an engagement with the Eighth U. S. Cavalry in 
1868, leaving the chieftainship of the tribe to his cousin Cochise, 
who was the head of the tribe until his death in 1882-3. He was 
succeeded by his son, known to us as "young Cochise"; what 
other name he had we never knew. He was killed by renegade 
Indians within the first year of his accession to the head of the 
tribe, which had then shrunk to a sm.all band of old men and a 
few women and children. 



J3 

Thus in thirty-six years of American rule every member but 
two of this family that for many years, perhaps more than a cen- 
tury, had ruled this tribe had met a violent death at the hands 
of the Americans. 

With the discovery of gold in California, a route of travel to 
the Pacific Coast, the Old Southern Overland, was quickly es- 
tablished, and the crawling wagon trains and the primitive over- 
land coaches were dragging their weary way over these arid 
plains to the land of gold. From the first, quite amicable rela- 
tions were maintained between these wayfarers and the Indian 
inhabitants of the country, particularly with the Overland stage 
line. A w^ell-authenticated story is told of an encounter between 
a station keeper at one of the company's stations and Cochise. 
This station keeper had long had very friendly relations with 
Cochise, and the exchange of game for tobacco and ammunition 
had long been the custom between them. On one occasion the 
station man found an Indian stealing corn from the company's 
storehouse. He drove him off, administering a sound kick as he 
went, which much accelerated his departure. The next day 
Cochise appeared with a number of his father's band and made 
complaint of the bad treatment of his follower. The station 
keeper acknowledged the violence used, but said that the man 
was a thief, and that instead of shooting him, as he had a right 
to do by Indian law, he had kicked him out of camp. If he was 
not satisfied with his treatment, he would do as they did in his 
country when one had struck another a blow. They would stand 
up and fight it out. Cochise should put his man up at a dis- 
tance of fifteen paces, giving him whatever arms he wanted, and 
at the v/ord, to be given by Cochise, they should commence to 
fight in any way that they wished until one or the other was 
killed. To this Cochise assented as perfectly fair and they pro- 
ceeded to do so. The Indian, when he saw how the thing was 
going, concluded that his honor could be better soothed by a 
present of tobacco. To this Cochise would not agree, telling 
the Indian that he was a thief, had lied about it, and now was a 
coward, and that he should fight or be driven out of the band. 
Thus cornered, the Indian mustered up the courage to stand up 
before the station keeper. Cochise gave the word to fire and the 
Indian was killed before he had time to raise his gun. Cochise 
declared the whole thing fair and no trouble came to the station 



14 

man on account of the affair. This incident was told me by the 
superintendent of the stage company, who vouched for its ab- 
solute truth. 

Friendly relations were maintained between the whites and 
all parts of the Apache nation up to the year 1857, wh.en they 
became somewhat strained by lawless acts on the part of passing 
wagon trains. In 1858 there was committed an act of bad judg- 
ment, to use the very kindest expression, that plunged the whole 
frontier into the fiercest Indian war that lias ever visited that 
section. A 3^oung officer just from West Point was stationed 
in the southwestern part of New Mexico, He was appealed to 
by some Mexicans living at his post to rescue a little girl said 
to be a captive in the band of Cochise's father. Procuring the 
services of a citizen, who while in the employ of the stage com- 
pany had known many of these Indians and could speak their 
language, he proceeded to the known habitat of the band and 
requested a council with them. There was no trouble in induc- 
ing the Indians to come in for the council and the subject of the 
talk was entered upon. The Indians in apparent fairness stated 
that they did not know of any such child and did not believe 
that such a child was with their band, but that if such was the 
case it should be sought and returned to the lieutenant at his 
post. This seemed a satisfactory solution of the matter and the 
Indians were invited to the officer's tent for something to eat. 
While they were thus engaged the lieutenant had ordered his 
sergeant to march the detachment up to the tent and to take the 
entire party prisoners. The front of the tent was towards a 
little stream that flowed through the narrow valley, while at the 
back was a very steep hill. As the soldiers approached, the 
quick ears of the Indians detected the movement and a rush was 
made for the door of the tent to escape. They were met with a 
line of fixed bayonets that rendered escape impossible and the 
party was captured. In the scuffle one Indian was killed by a 
bayonet thrust and three, the captain of the band and two sons, 
were captured. The oldest son, Cochise, was at the back of the 
tent, with a cup of coffee in one hand and his knife, with which 
he had been cutting some beef, in the other. Instead of rushing 
to the door of the tent with the others, he turned and with his 
knife slashed the back of the tent and, jumping through the hole 
thus made, fled up the hill and escaped. He told me years after 



15 

that when he reached the top of the hill he still had the coffee 
cup in his hand. Had the matter ended here, it might have been 
in some way arranged, although the situation was of the gravest. 
But the officer's ignorance of Indian ways seemed to be phenom- 
enal, and he again tried to open communication with the Indians. 
At first the interpreter flatly refused to have anything to do with 
the matter (he had known nothing of the lieutenant's plan to 
capture the Indians), but after much persuasion and, some say, 
threats, he was induced to again try to communicate with the 
Indians. In so doing he was captured and dragged off by them. 
The next day he was brought to such a position that he could 
call to the lieutenant, but without any chance of a rescue. The 
Indians proposed to exchange him for the Indians that were 
prisoners. To this the lieutenant would not agree, but told him 
to tell the Indians that if he was injured he would hang the In- 
dians that he held prisoners. His mutilated remains were found 
a short time after and the tliree Indians were promptly hung. 

An Indian war ensued that involved all the branches of the 
Apache tribe as well as the Navajos, who were always ready for 
trouble on any or no pretext. The army was in sufficient force 
in that region to control the situation until the commencement 
of the troubles of 1861, but the defections of that period and the 
cowardly surrender of Major Linde and the Fort Fillmore gar- 
rison left the country almost entirely stripped of troops, so that 
until the arrival of the Colorado volunteers from the north and 
the California column from the west the Apaches worked their 
diabolical will with the country. They believed that they had 
forever driven the whites from their country. The active oper- 
ations following the arrival of these two considerable bodies 
of troops compelled the surrender of the entire Navajo nation 
and drove what remained of the Apaches to those mountain fast- 
nesses before described, with the loss of very many of their tribe. 

Upon the family of Cuchillo Negro the loss had been partic- 
ularly heavy. The trouble was started by the hanging without 
cause of a son and two grandsons. The oldest son, Mangus 
Colorado, the head of the tribe, while in the guardhouse at Fort 
Bayard, had been murdered on the plea that he was trying to 
escape. And when in 1S67 Castile, the then head of the tribe, 
was killed in a fair fight with the Eighth Cavalry, he being the 
attacking party, there remained but Cochise, with his bo}'' of 



i6 

about ten years, to continue the struggle, and the added fierce- 
ness and brutality showed ihaL he remembered the affair of 1858. 
But these struggles were always to the disadvantage of the 
Indians. These continued reverses had such a dispiriting effect 
upon the Indians that soon small bands, under their immediate 
captains, began to break off from the tribe and make peace. By 
the beginning of the year 1871 we had succeeded in making a sort 
of peace with the heads of all of the bands except that of Cochise. 
Depredations still continued and we believed that much of these 
depredations were the work of these so-called friendly Indians. 
It was promptly charged to Cochise by these Indians. We were 
therefore particularly anxious to effect an understanding with 
him. 

From the unfortunate occurrence of 1858 until his final agree- 
ment in 1872 I do not believe that Cochise ever had friendly re- 
lations except with one white man. This was a Capt. Jefferds, 
who had commanded a troop of California volunteer cavalry. 
He had settled in the country after his discharge from the volun- 
teer service. He was supposed to be prospecting in the moun- 
tains in Cochise's countr)^ and was supposed to have effected 
friendly relations with Cochise. This we believed could only 
have been accomplished by means of a contraband trade vvitli 
this band. It happened to fall to my lot to be the one to furnish 
the proof positive in the matter. I was much given to hunting 
and to visiting the Mexican settlements and Indian camps in the 
country surrounding the fort at which I was then stationed, and 
as I had been able to afford the people, Mexican and Indian 
alike, some aid in the way of my profession, I was quite well 
known to both and was received in friendship by all. In one of 
my excursions I came upon Capt. Jefferds with a half dozen of 
the most villainous-looking individuals, whether Mexican or In- 
dian I did not have time to see. They were arranging a lot of 
packs of powder and lead for transportation to the mountains. 
The surprise was mutual and I concluded that I was not exactly 
a welcome visitor. I did not stand on the order of my going, 
but went at once. I had caught the name marked on one of the 
packages, which was that of a merchant in the vicinity. So at 
one shot I had bagged the whole bunch, having the proof posi- 
tive of this illicit trade, which, if known to the surrounding 
ranchmen, Avould have taken Jefferds and his commercial friend 



*7 

to the nearest tree. It was determined by the military author- 
ities to act on the fears of these culprits and through them en- 
deavor to arrange for a meeting with Cochise. They were all, 
Cochise as well as the others, in a very bad predicament, as by 
action on the part of the military the merchant would be de- 
stroyed, Jefferds either in jail or driven to Cochise, who, with his 
supplies cut off, could be soon hunted down and destroyed or 
driven to Mexico, neither of which contingencies v/as desirable 
as a termination of the war. 

Negotiations were opened through the trader and Jefferds, 
which led to the arrangements for a meeting between the com- 
manding officer of the district of New Mexico and Cochise. 
This meeting was arranged to take place about twenty-five miles 
west of the little Mexican pueblo of Canada Alamosa. The 
party was to consist of eight men on each side, the negotiators 
to be unarmed and no troops or Indians nearer than twenty- 
five miles. I had the somewhat doubtful honor to be one of the 
party, for such was Cochise's reputation that it was generally 
believed that this would prove a second Canby affair. The mili- 
tary party consisted of Gen. Gordon Granger, commanding the 
District of New Mexico; Gen. J. Irwin Gregg, Col. Eighth 
Cavalry; Lieut.-Col. J. P. Willard, Assistant Adjutant-General of 
the district, and myself, and each had a mounted orderly fully 
armed. Col. Willard and myself had our revolvers, as we did 
not consider ourselves as negotiators. 

When we reached the place of conference there were no In- 
dians to be seen, so we dismounted and seated ourselves under 
the shade of a Cottonwood tree to await developments. Soon 
Capt. T. Jefferds approached us down a steep hillside and greeted 
the party. To the Generals he was quite profuse, and to me, I 
thought, a bit sinister, as if remembering our last encounter. 
This may have been my imagination, but I took it as a warning 
to look out for myself if anything went wrong in the conference. 
He told us that Cochise would soon be with us, chatting pleas- 
antly with the party. Col. Willard and myself had made up our 
minds that we would account for Cochise and Jefferds if any- 
thing went wrong in the council. 

Soon from over the hill from which Jefferds had come appeared 
seven Indians, one in front, and two paces in the rear two fol- 
lowed, while some ten or twelve yards behind were four fully 



i8 

armed Indians, who halted at the exact distance from our party 
that our orderlies were. Thus the Indian party was the exact 
counterpart of ours, Cochise and Jefferds without arms, as were 
Gens. Granger and Gregg; two Indians with revolvers, as were 
Col. Willardand myself, and four fully armed Indians, as were our 
orderlies. As Cochise approached we all looked with much curi- 
osity, as we believed ourselves the first white men that had seen 
him face to face and lived to tell of it since his outbreak four- 
teen years before. He was rather tall, over six feet, with broad 
shoulders, and impressed one as a wonderfully strong man, of 
much endurance, accustomed to command and to expect instant 
and implicit obedience. This was characteristic of his family ; 
his uncle, Mangus Colorado, and his son, Castile, had been 
large men, and if the tales of the Mexicans could be believed, 
his grandfather, old Cuchillo Negro, was almost a giant. Al- 
together he impressed me as the strongest Indian that I had ever 
seen, and at this time I had known some of the famous Indians 
of the West. I had been in Indian fights with Kicking Bird, 
Satanta and old Satank, had known Stone Calf, Red Cloud and 
Spot Tail, of the Sioux. I spoke Apache after a fashion and 
was quite friendly with Loco and Victoria, and knew Cadette, 
of the Navajoes. He seemed to me in this first meeting the 
greatest Indian that I had yet seen. In my somewhat extended 
life in the Indian country I had known many of the famous In- 
dians of the West — Young Man Afraid of his Horses, Gaul, 
Black Wolf, Roman Nose, Chiefs Joseph and Moses, of the 
Western Indians, and I do not hesitate in naming Cochise as the 
greatest Indian that I have ever met. 

As Cochise and his party approached we moved forward a few 
steps to meet him, Jefferds placing himself by the side of 
Cochise as of his party. He introduced the party. I, being the 
junior of the party, came last in the introduction. I fancied that 
I received a bit more of attention than the others; I did not know 
whether it was because I could speak Apache (I caught Jefferds 
telling Cochise to look out, as I could understand him) or because 
of my discoveries of the trade business; at any rate, I felt myself 
a marked man in the proceedings. Gen. Granger, who was the 
spokesman of our party, commenced the usual "patter" of the 
Indian counsel talk, "of the love of the Grand Tatta (the Pres- 
ident) for his red children and of the happiness that it would give 



19 

him to have his white and red children live together in peace 
and harmony." He continued this kind of talk for some time, 
thinking no doubt that he was making quite an impression on 
his Indian audience, which might have been so, but certainly not 
on his white hearers, and I for one was hoping that he would 
finish and let the Indian have his say. AH of this was very fairly 
rendered in Apache by Jefferds, and as my particular part of the 
function was to see that a fair interpretation was given on both 
sides I was particularly alert, more so, perhaps, as I was fully 
convinced that our personal safety, and my own especially, de- 
pended on the outcome of the council. 

When Granger had finished Cochise v.-aitcd a moment and 
then rose to reply. He was without the Indian adornments, 
usually a great feature of the councils that I had hitherto seen. 
Clad in a buckskin hunting shirt, belted in at the waist by a 
Navajo garter, leggins and moccasins of the same material, the 
only bit of finery about him was a somewhat gaudy Mexican 
poncho, which was draped about him with a careless grace; his 
face while at rest was perfectly impassive. I wish it were within 
my power to give as I heard it this finest bit of Indian oratory 
that I ever listened to. He commenced in meager, somewhat 
guttural Apache, but as he warmed to his subject he slid into 
the more graceful Spanish, of which he was a master, and with 
the expressive "sign talk" he made an address that affected me 
as but one other orator ever has, and that was Wendell Phillips 
in one of his early abolition speeches. His speech, as I remem- 
ber it after a lapse of thirty-five years, was about as follows: 

" This for a very long time has been the home of my people; they 
came from the darkness, few in numbers and feeble. The coun- 
try was held by a much stronger and more numerous people, 
and from their stone houses we were quickly driven. We were 
a hunting people, living on the animals that we could kill. We 
came to these mountains about us; no one lived here, and so 
we took them for our home and country. Here we grew from 
the first feeble band to be a great people, and covered the whole 
country as the clouds cover the mountains. Many people came 
to our country. First the Spanish, with their horses and their 
iron shirts, their long knives and guns, great wonders to my 
simple people. We fought some, but they never tried to drive 
us from our homes in these mountains. After many years the 



Spanish soldiers were driven away and the Mexican ruled the 
land. With these little wars came, but we were now a strong 
people and we did not fear them. At last in my youth came the 
white man, your people. Under the counsels of my grandfather, 
who had for a very long time been the head of the Apaches, they 
were received with friendship. Soon their numbers increased 
and many passed through my country to the great waters of the 
setting sun. Your soldiers came and their strong houses were 
all through my country. I received favors from your people and 
did all that I could in return and we lived at peace. At last 
your soldiers did me a very great wrong, and I and my whole 
people went to war with them. At first we were successful and 
your soldiers were driven away and your people killed and we 
again possessed our land. Soon many soldiers came from the 
north and from the west, and my people were driven to the 
mountain hiding places; but these did not protect us, and soon 
my people were flying from one mountain to another, driven by 
the soldiers, even as the wind is now driving the clouds. I have 
fought long and as best I could against you. I have destroyed 
many of your people, but where I have destroyed one white m.an 
many have come in his place; but where an Indian has been killed, 
there has been none to come in his place, so that the great people 
that welcomed you with acts of kindness to this land are now but 
a feeble band that fly before your soldiers as the deer before 
the hunter, and must all perish if this war continues. I have 
come to you, not from any love for you or for your great father 
in Washington, or from any regard for his or your wishes, but 
as a conquered chief, to try to save alive the few people that 
still remain to me. I am the last of my family, a family that 
for very many years have been the leaders of this people, and 
on me depends their future, whether they shall utterly vanish 
from the land or that a small remnant remain for a few years 
to see the sun rise over these mountains, their home. I here 
pledge my word, a word that has never been broken, that if your 
great father will set aside a part of my own country, where I 
and my little band can live, we will remain at peace with your 
people forever. If from his abundance he will give food for my 
women and children, whose protectors his soldiers have killed, 
with blankets to cover their nakedness, I will receive them with 



21 

gratitude. If not, I will do my best to feed and clothe them, 
in peace with the white man. I have spoken." 

We all sat for a moment in silence ; even the garrulous Gen. 
Granger was for a moment silenced. Much general talk en- 
sued, in which it was agreed that Cochise should remain with 
his band, in the neighborhood of Canada Alamosa, receiving 
rations and annuity goods with the bands of Loco and Victoria, 
and a treaty to that effect was duly signed by the Generals and 
Cochise, and that when he should select a satisfactory place he 
should have a reservation by himself. He was urged to go to 
Washington and talk to the President ; he said no, that he had 
rather talk to soldiers, for they sometimes kept their word ; that 
he did not like white men's ways ; " that he did not care to eat 
little fishes out of tin boxes." 

We had brought with us to the little Mexican town where we 
had left our cavalry escort a lot of articles, which we thought 
would be acceptable to him and his people, as an earnest of our 
good faith. As Gen. Granger mentioned these to him, and 
asked him to go to the town to receive them, his face lighted up 
for a moment ; but he said no, he did not wish to go with the 
soldiers. 

Capt. Jefferds turned to him and said: "If you want to go, 
I will pledge you my head that you will be safe ; these men are 
talking straight to you." 

Cochise turned to him and said : " You believe these white 
men. I trusted them once ; I went to their cam.p ; my father and 
two brothers were hung ; no, I will not go." 

After this council, Cochise remained Vv'ith his band in the 
vicinity of Canada Alamosa, drawing his rations with the bands 
of Loco and Victoria, but urged as early a separation as possi- 
ble, saying that he could not control other than his own band, 
and that troubles would arise that he could not prevent, and 
that the blame would be laid to him. 

He was the only Indian chief that I ever knew that could en- 
force instant obedience to a given command. It was the 
custom for all of the New Mexican Apaches west of the Rio 
Grande to gather at Cafiada Alamosa to receive their rations 
once a month. On ration days a small detachment of infantry 
from the neighboring posts were sent to the agency to prevent 
any disorder. I was frequently at the agency on these issue 



days. On one occasion it appeared to me that there had been 
much drinking among the Indians, and signs of trouble from 
that cause were present. The guard was under the command 
of a sergeant. The sergeant was much troubled by the condi- 
tions existing and early came to me for advice and assistance. 
The men, about twenty-five in number, were quietly placed in 
the most advantageous position available and the outcome 
awaited with some anxiety. The explosion soon came in a dis- 
pute between the issue clerk and a drunken Indian who was try- 
ing to get more than his proper rations. The Indian drew his 
gun and tried to shoot the clerk. Loco and Victoria, with much 
talk and entreaty, succeeded in getting the gun, but the Indian 
was quickly supplied with another by some of his drunken 
friends, and serious trouble seemed imminent. At this juncture 
Cochise appeared. At a glance he took in the situation. He 
gave a yell so quick and shrill that I did not catch its import, 
but its effect was instantly apparent. Some sixty or eighty of 
his immediate band rushed among the struggling mass about the 
door of the agency and in no gentle manner forced them away, 
while two stalwart bucks rushed upon the offending Indian and, 
throwing him face down, each seized a leg and ran with him out 
of the town. Cochise came at once to me and said that the sol- 
diers were not needed, that he would keep the Indians in order. 
He then ordered Loco and Victoria to at once leave the town with 
all their people. They demurred, saying that they had not yet 
received their rations. He told them to go at once or he would 
kill them all, that v/hen they were sober they could come back 
for their rations, but to go at once, and they went. 

I have never before or since seen such prompt obedience 
among Indians. After this occurrence Cochise kept himself and 
his band as much apart from the other Indians as possible. He 
was soon removed to a reservation of his own choosing in the 
San Simone valley, with his friend Capt. Jefferds as his agent. 
He lived at peace with the whites until his death, some years 
after. 

We all forgave Jefferds for his peccadilloes of the contraband 
trade, and many blessed him for the part that he took in the 
abatement of this terrible scourge of southern New Mexico. 
Truly this was a case of doing evil that great good might come. 



HD 1 ? S 



f 



23 

On Cochise's death-bed he called his son, the last survivor of 
this line of strong men, to him, and in the most solemn manner 
committed his few surviving people to his care, charging him, as 
he honored the memory of his long line of illustrious ancestors, 
and as he loved his people, to keep the faith that he had pledged 
to the white chiefs in the mountains. And this was the most 
savage of all the savages that I have ever known. The boy kept 
the faith and was killed by a band of renegade Apaches whom 
he was trying to induce to return to the reservation. And thus 
died every member of this family that for five generations had 
been the known head of the Apache nation. 

From that beautiful mountain country that the Apache loved 
so well and defended so bravely all are gone. In the sweltering 
heat of the San Carlos Reservation are gathered a few scattered 
remnants of these mountain bands, while tl;e last of the irrecon- 
cilables, Geronimo and Loco, with a few followers, still exist in 
banishment under the shadow of Fort Sill. Truly a Vanished 
Race of Aboriginal Founders. 



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